The Pakistan Conspiracy, A Novel Of Espionage by Francesca Salerno Page A
Authors: Francesca Salerno
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course, preferably in one place, and I will need time to test circuits.”
“In one place? What do you mean?”
“LeClerc told me that the physics package was kept in a different location from the electronics.”
“That has changed,” Marchenko said. “All the materials are ready to be assembled at a special site. I have also undertaken the precaution of having my own technical advisor check the circuits and other components.”
“That will simplify my work considerably,” Wantree said. “He will have told you that I will want especially to examine the core. Oxidation and flaking, and so forth.”
Marchenko made an impatient motion with his hand.
“The Soviet Union was the greatest military state in the history of mankind, excepting perhaps the Romans, or the armies of Hannibal,” Marchenko said slowly. “Do you have any idea how carefully we tested and maintained in constant readiness all our matériel?”
“Then you also know that plutonium is a remarkably unstable metal.”
“I hardly think so. Plutonium-239 has a half-life of nearly 25,000 years.”
“That is not what I meant,” said Wantree peevishly. “When exposed to damp air, it forms oxides and hydrides that bubble up off the metal with huge increase in volume, much as rust does on exposed iron, except that in this case these materials can flake off and spontaneously ignite in oxygen. Even in pristine condition, if stored anywhere near the other components, plutonium rots them with gamma rays. When your device was part of the Soviet arsenal, it received almost constant maintenance and care.”
“Of course I know it, because I myself provided that maintenance,” Marchenko said sharply. “And I have continued to provide it, nursing this mechanism almost as I would a grandchild.”
The two men sat for some minutes without speaking. Wantree had no wish to further provoke a man whose cooperation Jacques LeClerc had already promised him. He realized that it had been a mistake to come without LeClerc to undertake precisely the kinds of negotiations that were necessary to secure Marchenko’s cooperation. Fighting for access was not part of his brief.
“Did you bring your own tools?” Marchenko said at last.
“No. It seemed a foolish and also a needless risk. Anyway, all I need for the first visit is my own pair of eyes.”
“Your first visit?”
“I imagine it will take more than one, but I may be wrong,” Wantree said timidly.
“This other man,” Marchenko said. “This consultant LeClerc wants to send me in addition to you, do you know when he arrives in Moscow?”
“I’m afraid not. I do not even know his name.”
“He’s an Arab,” Marchenko said, almost spitting out the words. “Al-Greeb, Yasser al-Greeb.”
***
The slight man with the stained carpetbag left the No. 7 train from Almaty and slipped anonymously into the vast marble reaches of the Paveletsky train station in south central Moscow. Though the trip had taken 90 hours, Yasser Khalidi al-Greeb felt refreshed and alert. Ever since his imprisonment in 2005 by Jordan’s Mukhabarat, every day he had control over his life and movements seemed like a gift to him from Allah. Even the surly old woman snoring and cursing in the seat next to him had failed to irritate him.
The business that brought him to Moscow would take no more than an hour or two, and the round-trip travel time amounted to almost eight days. Far from being bothered by this, Al-Greeb took this as a measure of the care with which he approached his work and another opportunity to push away from infidel mispriorities. The Western obsession with time seemed absurd to him. He would happily have traveled the distance from Almaty by camel had it sharpened the quality of his service to Allah.
He was traveling with a Kazakh identity card rather than a passport, which allowed him unlimited travel within the Russian
“In one place? What do you mean?”
“LeClerc told me that the physics package was kept in a different location from the electronics.”
“That has changed,” Marchenko said. “All the materials are ready to be assembled at a special site. I have also undertaken the precaution of having my own technical advisor check the circuits and other components.”
“That will simplify my work considerably,” Wantree said. “He will have told you that I will want especially to examine the core. Oxidation and flaking, and so forth.”
Marchenko made an impatient motion with his hand.
“The Soviet Union was the greatest military state in the history of mankind, excepting perhaps the Romans, or the armies of Hannibal,” Marchenko said slowly. “Do you have any idea how carefully we tested and maintained in constant readiness all our matériel?”
“Then you also know that plutonium is a remarkably unstable metal.”
“I hardly think so. Plutonium-239 has a half-life of nearly 25,000 years.”
“That is not what I meant,” said Wantree peevishly. “When exposed to damp air, it forms oxides and hydrides that bubble up off the metal with huge increase in volume, much as rust does on exposed iron, except that in this case these materials can flake off and spontaneously ignite in oxygen. Even in pristine condition, if stored anywhere near the other components, plutonium rots them with gamma rays. When your device was part of the Soviet arsenal, it received almost constant maintenance and care.”
“Of course I know it, because I myself provided that maintenance,” Marchenko said sharply. “And I have continued to provide it, nursing this mechanism almost as I would a grandchild.”
The two men sat for some minutes without speaking. Wantree had no wish to further provoke a man whose cooperation Jacques LeClerc had already promised him. He realized that it had been a mistake to come without LeClerc to undertake precisely the kinds of negotiations that were necessary to secure Marchenko’s cooperation. Fighting for access was not part of his brief.
“Did you bring your own tools?” Marchenko said at last.
“No. It seemed a foolish and also a needless risk. Anyway, all I need for the first visit is my own pair of eyes.”
“Your first visit?”
“I imagine it will take more than one, but I may be wrong,” Wantree said timidly.
“This other man,” Marchenko said. “This consultant LeClerc wants to send me in addition to you, do you know when he arrives in Moscow?”
“I’m afraid not. I do not even know his name.”
“He’s an Arab,” Marchenko said, almost spitting out the words. “Al-Greeb, Yasser al-Greeb.”
***
The slight man with the stained carpetbag left the No. 7 train from Almaty and slipped anonymously into the vast marble reaches of the Paveletsky train station in south central Moscow. Though the trip had taken 90 hours, Yasser Khalidi al-Greeb felt refreshed and alert. Ever since his imprisonment in 2005 by Jordan’s Mukhabarat, every day he had control over his life and movements seemed like a gift to him from Allah. Even the surly old woman snoring and cursing in the seat next to him had failed to irritate him.
The business that brought him to Moscow would take no more than an hour or two, and the round-trip travel time amounted to almost eight days. Far from being bothered by this, Al-Greeb took this as a measure of the care with which he approached his work and another opportunity to push away from infidel mispriorities. The Western obsession with time seemed absurd to him. He would happily have traveled the distance from Almaty by camel had it sharpened the quality of his service to Allah.
He was traveling with a Kazakh identity card rather than a passport, which allowed him unlimited travel within the Russian
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